


Mind Games

by nicolesoul



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: F/M, Gen, M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent, Mind Control, Nogitsune Stiles
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-02-20
Updated: 2015-10-24
Packaged: 2018-01-13 03:33:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 11,797
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1211047
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nicolesoul/pseuds/nicolesoul
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>As the Nogitsune wreaks havoc on Beacon Hills, Stiles struggles to regain control of his body and mind, waging war not only against the dark spirit possessing him, but against himself.</p><p>Post-3x18 and on, mostly canon-compliant.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> You'll have to forgive me, this is my first Teen Wolf fic. Just couldn't get the idea out of my head

When he first wakes, he feels the cold basement floor beneath him and immediately squeezes his eyes tighter because _oh, no please, he can’t be there again_.

Then, the floor begins to soften and warm. Stiles cracks his eyes open just a little and a hazy green color floats in front of him. He grows warmer, registering the sun on his skin and swallows, noting his dry throat. His mouth is open, the unmistakable taste of grass in his tongue.

“You okay, dude?” A voice asks from above him.

Stiles’ first thought is no, he’s not okay, but then he can’t quite remember the reason why he isn’t. He slowly lifts himself onto his haunches. Scott McCall hovers over him. There’s concern on his friend’s face, but his lips are twitching up into a smile.

“No,” Stiles huffs as he stands, “I am most definitely not okay. You nearly took my head off with that thing.” The words fall out of his mouth with practiced ease, like lines in a play he’s rehearsed a hundred times. But he doesn’t quite understand the context of them.

Scott shrugs and offers a small smile of apology that is clearly threatening to turn into a laugh. “Sorry, but man did you hit the ground fast.”

“Yeah, well, I think that’s a fairly natural reaction when a lacrosse ball comes flying at your head,” Stiles says, crossing his arms, “You know you’re supposed to be aiming at the goal, right?”

“I know,” Scott twirls his lacrosse stick in his hands, “I think I’m getting better though.”

“Just don’t get your hopes up of being the first freshman to make first string,” Stiles’ mouth continues to run, but he doesn’t pay attention to the words. Instead he studies Scott. He looks too young, too short, his hair is still in its natural moppy curls. There’s something wrong with this picture, but Stiles can’t put his finger on it.

Whatever Stiles was saying, he’s done now and Scott scoops up the offending lacrosse ball. “Let’s go again,” he says, running down the field.

Stiles goes to follow automatically, but his eye catches something strange. A girl, sitting on the sideline bench. Her knees are drawn up to her chest, eyes glued to Scott, who’s begun to toss balls at the net again, most of the missing. She can’t be more than 14, hair tied back in a pony-tail. Stiles heads towards her and her eyes flicker over to him before focusing back on Scott.

“Who are you?” he asks when he reaches the bench.

The girl looks up at him, but says nothing.

“You don’t belong here,” Stiles says.

She tips her head to the side, “Neither do you.”

Stiles frowns and turns to tell Scott to come over and help him deal with this girl, but when he looks there’s already a Stiles with Scott, laughing and chucking lacrosse balls at his friend. Like Scott, this Stiles looks too young, his hair still cropped short, acne on his round face, not yet free of baby fat.

“It’s a memory,” Stiles says.

“Summer before you started high school,” the girl adds, following his gaze to the two boys fooling around, “It’s a good memory, a safe place to hide. Not many of those left.”

Stiles sits down on the bench next to her. “What are you talking about?”

“You’re supposed to control the memories, but it’s taking them. It hasn’t reached this one yet. It’s too good. Too warm.”

Stiles let out a soft growl of frustration. “I don’t understand what you’re talking about.”

“You need to remember,” she looks back to him. Her eyes are a familiar hazel that he can’t place.

“Remember what?” He tries to think, but his mind feels fuzzy.

The girl shudders. “When is a door not a door?”

Stiles feels a sharp pain in his forehead as the answer comes to him. “When it’s a jar.”

The younger Stiles has prodded Scott to don the goalie uniform and sneaks balls past him easily, rolling them on the ground while Scott helplessly drowns in the equipment far too big for him. Stiles remembers spending freshman year on the lacrosse team bench, he remembers going into the woods looking for a dead body, he remembers Scott growing stronger, growing fangs, becoming a werewolf. He remembers Allison and Derek and Peter and the list of people goes on and on. He remembers the Kanima and Isaac and Erica and Boyd. He remembers the Darach and the Alphas and his father missing and hands forcing him under the icy water. He remembers not being able to sleep for days, remembers counting his fingers in class. Remembers matching his handwriting to the writing on the blackboard spelling out K-I-Ra.

Stiles drops his head in his hands and squeezes his eyes shut. “Make it stop,” he whimpers.

The girl rests a hand on his shoulder. “What does everyone have, but no one can lose?”

A dark cold basement floor, a gravely taunting voice, a backwards five, waking in the forest, the hospital, Scott.

“A shadow.”

The girl takes back her hand. Stiles looks up. The younger versions of him and Scott are gone and the sky has begun to darken.

“This isn’t how this memory is supposed to go,” he says, panicked, “It isn’t. The sky stays clear and blue, we mess around on the field till the sun sets and Dad comes to pick us up.”

The girl licks her lips, looking up nervously, her fingers dance out a nervous pattern on her knee. “Focus on it,” she says.

“On what?”

“On the memory! On how it felt. On your breath running short from laughing. On the sweat dampening your shirt. On Scott’s idiot face when he got tangled up in the net.”

The clouds part, the sun reemerges and Stiles watches as the very scene she mentioned unfurls on the field.

“How did you do that?”

“I didn’t, you did.”

“Yeah, but how did you know what to do?”

“It feeds on darkness,” she explains, “On strife, on chaos. You remembering all the bad stuff brought its attention. You have to focus on the good feeling of the memory.”

“The Nogitsune?”

She nods. “Focus on the happiness this memory brings.”

Stiles tries, but inside he’s still panicking. It’s him, he was right, he’s the one being possessed.

“Who are you?” he asks again.

The girl gives a cautionary look at the sky again. “I’m you.”

The words send a tingle up his spine, but he tries to do as she said and focus on the good memory still playing out in front of them. “Um, pretty sure I’m not a 14 year old girl.”

The girl smiles. “No you’re not. I’m not either, you just made me look this way.”

“Wh-,” Another memory hits Stiles of a red-headed 14 year old Lydia Martin glaring at him for knocking over her lunch tray because he had been too nervous from talking to her to stand still. “Lydia, you look like Lydia.”

“I guess she’s who you picture as me.”

“But I thought you were me? Does that mean I picture Lydia as myself?” Stiles squints, trying to understand.

“No, idiot,” The younger version of Lydia huffs, “I’m not you, just part of you, I’m like your conscience, the little voice in your head telling you to do better?”

“Oh,” Stiles sort of understands now, “Like my super-ego?”

“Hm, I guess you were paying attention during Psychology.”

“Yeah,” Stiles scratches his head absently, “It’s Freud, right? The ego, super-ego and the id. But if you’re the super-ego where are the other two? And why are you 14?”

“I’m blending in,” Lydia says, “A 14-year-old Lydia belongs in a 14-year-old Stiles memory.” She pauses considering his other question, “I guess you’d the ego, the conscious part of the brain, the thing that makes you Stiles. But the Nogitsune can only take over when you’re not around, when you’re unconscious.”

“And the id?”

“That’s the part of you that’s your basic drives. Your carnal urges, your need to survive,” Lydia draws her knees back to her chest, “It needed that part to get into your mind. It’s the part of you that is closest to the Nogitsune, so it was the easiest to take over.”

Out in the distance, Stiles can see the headlights of his father’s truck as the sun sets behind him and Lydia.

“How do I get it out of me?” he whispers.

Lydia shakes her head. “You can’t. I tried to warn you, I tried to tell you to shut the door, to wake up.”

Stiles turns to her, alarmed. “We’ve been here before haven’t we?”

Lydia shrugs, “Here, other memories, dreams, anywhere I could reach you till it got too strong and I had to hide. But you never remembered when you woke up. I think it kept taking your memories.”

“So now I’m trapped, in my own body, while some monster wears me like a meat suit.” He lets out a growl of frustration. “If I’m the ego, I should be in control, I should be able to take back control.”

“You can’t!” Lydia exclaims, “If you try to go after it, the Nogitsune will consume you and me and then that’s it. Once we’re gone, it takes over, no more Stiles.”

“What do you expect me to do? Just hide in these old memories?” He looks over to himself and Scott scooping up their equipment, shoving each other playfully while his dad watches with a grin.

“Come on boys. Get in the car,” Sheriff calls, “I promised your mom you’d be home for dinner Scott.”

“Yes,” Lydia says, “Scott and the others will figure out what’s wrong with you and figure out how to get that thing out of us. But until then, you have to stay safe, otherwise there won’t be anything left of Stiles for them to save.”

“I can save myself.”

But his protest falls on deaf ears. Lydia ignores him as the sun returns to its high point in the sky and his dad’s truck returns to drop him and Scott back off at the beginning of the memory.

“I can,” he stands, “Just tell me how to get out of here.”

Lydia keeps her eyes trained on the field.

“Come on,” he prods, “You’re part of me. The more reasonable part of me sure, but you’re still me. You know I can do this. It’s my mind, I can take back control.”

Lydia’s shoulders slump. “Fine,” she says softly, “You need to use the doors. That’s how you can move around. I don’t know what you think you’re going to be able to do though.”

Stiles looks around the field, “I don’t see any doors.”

“Yeah well this one’s hard to find cause there’s no reason you should be leaving,” Lydia sulks.

Stiles feels a bit of guilt creeping up, but shakes it off when he spots his dad’s truck still waiting patiently in the parking lot.

“The truck!” He takes off running.

“Be careful!” Lydia calls again behind him, “And remember to shut all the doors behind you!”

He acknowledges her warning with a wave, yanking the backseat door to his dad’s car open as fast as he can. The sheriff is nowhere to be found when he slides in the seat and slams the door closed.


	2. Chapter 2

The car goes dark, then a blinding white light shines in Stiles’ eyes are he shuts them on instinct.

“No response,” a detached voice says.

Stiles peeks open one eye, than the other. He’s in a hospital room. He sighs in relief and goes to rub his eyes in attempt to make the dots stop dancing in his vision, but his hand won’t come up.

Stiles looks down, alarmed. His wrists are both buckled down to the sides of the chair he’s sitting in. His ankles are too. An IV is attached in his left arm. He can hear the steady beeping of his heart rate to his right.

He twists and squirms in the chair, trying to break free to no avail. There’s a large window in front of him and he can see shadows moving outside, so he opens his mouth to call for help, but no sound comes out.

Moving more frantically now, the beeping on the right growing faster, Stiles tugs and pulls on his restraints, wondering how the hell all those magicians manage to escape effortlessly from shark tanks and bank vaults hung in the air.

“How’s he doing?” A familiar voice captures Stiles attention and he falls still, the beeping steadies. Two silhouettes are in the window now, one is tall and broad and the other is short with curly hair.  

“The same,” Melissa McCall sighs, reaching out a hand on his father’s shoulder, “Unresponsive.”

Stiles desperately shouts the contrary, but his yells are still silent.

The Sheriff shakes his head and the shadows fade, replaced by several heads. Stiles can tell they’re all looking intently at him, though he can’t make out any of their faces.

“We have to kill it before it kills him,” Allison’s voice floats through the window.

“Or before it kills someone else,” Isaac adds.

“Guys, he’ll be safe here,” Scott says, sounding less than sure.

“He’s broken out of here before, he can do it again,” Isaac retorts, “It’s just a matter of time.”

“We’ll figure something out,” Scott insists.

“I’m with Isaac,” One of the twins says, “We have a solution and our window of time is running out.” It’s probably Aiden, Stiles thinks, he’s never liked Aiden.

“Me too,” The other twin agrees, “We need to kill him now.” Then again, Stiles has never been a fan of Ethan either.     

“We can’t!” Scott exclaims, “There has to be a way to get the Nogitsune out. And once we figure that out, then we can kill it.”

“You heard Deaton, Scott,” Allison says gently, “There is no way.”

“That he knows of,” Scott argues, “We could still find something.”

“There’s no way,” Aiden repeats, “To kill the Nogitsune, we need to kill its host. We need to kill Stiles.”

Stiles’ blood runs cold as a silence falls over the group.

“I can’t,” Scott’s voice breaks, “He’s like my brother.”

Stiles nods vehemently. Scott’s his brother. Scott won’t hurt him. Scott will save him.

“If we don’t kill them both, that thing will eventually kill Stiles on its own and escape,” Isaac says, “We need to stop it now, Scott.”

“I-” Scott starts, but trails off.

“He’d want you to,” Allison insists, “If sacrificing himself meant saving everyone, Stiles would want to do it.”

As much as Stiles wants to think Allison is right, he would do the noble thing a sacrifice himself, all he can think now is that he’s not ready to die. Not ready to leave his father, his friends. There has to be another way.

Scott’s head hangs. “Ok,” he agrees, “Let’s do this.”

Stiles’ heart rate goes crazy as he start struggling to get loose again. Tears well up in his eyes, his mouth open desperate for the screams to come out. “It’s me, it’s me!” He wants to shout, but he remains mute.

The shadows in the window disappear, but one silhouette appears in the window of the door to his room. The knob turns slowly and Stiles goes rigid in fear as the door creaks open.

But none of the vicious werewolves he expects enter. Rather a middle-aged bespectacled man comes in. He’s balding and a little overweight; one hand tucked in his lab coat, the other holding a chart he looks rather immersed it.

“Mr. Stilinski,” he looks up and smiles at Stiles, “You’re awake.” 

Stiles tries to peer around him and see if his friends are outside, but the doctor shuts the door before he has a chance.

“How are we feeling, Mr. Stilinski?” he asks.

Stiles tries to answer, but still no sound comes out. The doctor is nonplused by this, in fact, he looks rather amused.

“What’s wrong, Mr. Stilinski?” he smiles, “Fox got your tongue?”

Stiles squeezes his eyes shut. If the frantic beeping behind him is any indication, his heart is about to jump out of his chest.

“Come on, Stiles,” the doctor’s voice is gone, replaced by a far more familiar sound, “That was pretty funny.”

He opens his eyes again, this time his own reflection stares back.

The Nogitsune grins sinisterly. “Don’t worry, Stiles,” it tells him, “It’s not real.” It gestures to the room around them, “None of this is real.” It points to the window, “They’re not real, well,” the Nogitsune giggles, “Not yet anyway.”

“What do you mean?” Stiles says, surprised to hear words finally come out of his mouth.  

“They haven’t decided to kill us yet,” The Nogitsune says, “But it’s only a matter of time before they realize it’s their only option.”

Stiles takes this as good news. He still has time to take control, to fight.

“They won’t,” he insists, “Scott won’t.”

“Oh, Stiles,” the Nogitsune sighs, “There is so much hope in you. It’s amazing considering all the darkness that lies underneath it.” It leans in, taking a deep breath, “You reek of it. Of pain and suffering. How could I possibly resist such a meal?”

It leans back and turns to the window, “Not to mention all those friends of yours. Oh, we are going to have such a good time.”

“I’m not going to let you hurt them,” Stiles warns, the binds have begun to cut into his wrists as he pulls against them.

“You don’t have a choice,” the Nogitsune says, “It was fun hiding from you at first, but now you know and they all know what we are, the real fun is going to start.”

“I’m going to stop you!” Stiles roars, lifting himself off the seat as far as his binds will allow.

“HA!” The Nogitsune laughs, its face, Stiles’ face, suddenly centimeters away from Stiles’ own and he falls back into the chair. “Stop us? How can you stop us? Why would you stop us when you begged us for this?”

“I didn’t.”

“Maybe not up here,” the Nogitsune taps his head and traces its finger down his face and throat and collarbone, stopping over his heart, “But deep in here,” it presses its finger into his chest, “Deep, deep in here, you want us. You need us, Stiles. You felt powerless and weak and so, so tired. And we offered you power and control and you let us in. You knew what we could do together, saw that we could to make you better.”

It retracts its hand and Stiles lets out a breath he didn’t realize he was holding.

“And we are making you better. But,” it sighs, “If you think you can stop us…if you think you _want_ to stop us,” The Nogitsune chuckles, “Go ahead and try.”

The Nogitsune vanishes along with the straps on Stiles’ wrists and ankles. Stiles rubs his raw skin and slowly stands up. The Nogitsune’s words burn in his brain. He doesn’t want to believe them, but he cannot help but doubt himself.

Had there been a part of him that wanted this? That let the Nogitsune in?

He recalls the younger version of Lydia’s words. She said it had been his id. That the Nogitsune had taken that over that part of him and used it as its entrance.

Stiles shakes his head, trying to focus. He has to keep moving, especially if the Nogitsune is aware of what he’s doing. So he charges ahead through the hospital room door, only to immediately be engulfed in blackness again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for the kudos and such! I'm glad people like it so far. 
> 
> If you're curious why it's tagged Sterek, I swear that's coming up.


	3. Chapter 3

“Take it easy with the door, this is new.”

Stiles jumps at the voice. He’s no longer in the hospital. This time the scene lightens slowly and he realizes he’s sitting in the passenger’s seat of a nice sports car. Outside the window, the highway flies by.

Derek Hale grins at him from the driver’s seat, an almost sinister look in his eye, his teeth not quite fangs but definitely sharper than the average humans. “What do you think?”

Stiles swallows. He’s been here before, but it’s not a memory.

It’s a dream.

“It’s nice,” he says automatically, much like he had on the lacrosse field with Scott, “Although, I’m partial to Porsche myself.”

Derek’s grin melts into a soft smile as he turns his attention back on the road. “Of course you are.”

They sit in a comfortable silence. Stiles chews on his bottom lip as he stares out the window. How is he supposed to go through a door now? Jump out a moving car? If it just happens in his head, will it still hurt? The binds in the hospital hurt his wrists, but when he looks down now they seem fine, the pain just a memory.

“Better safe than sorry,” Derek says. Stiles’ head snaps to him.

“What?” There’s no talking in this dream after the small conversation they just had. They just drive and drive and then Derek reaches over the consul and puts his hand on Stiles’ knee and then they pull over and…

Well, Stiles doesn’t plan on getting that far anyway.

“Why not?” Derek asks, “That’s my favorite part.”

“You’re reading my mind?”

Derek shrugs, “I don’t know if it’s really reading your mind if I’m part of it.”

Stiles pales. Whatever’s sitting next to him in this car isn’t his dream-Derek.

“No,” Derek says, “I’m more like, oh what did you call me before?”

“My id?”

“That’s it,” Derek laughs, “Although I prefer to think of myself more as your _animal instinct_.”

His eyes flash vibrant blue. “Appropriate, no?” 

Stiles doesn’t answer. Lydia had warned him this part of his mind was working with the Nogitsune and he was not about to stick around to see what that meant. He wraps his hand around the door handle, slowly unbuckling his seatbelt, but when he’s prepared himself to jump and pulls, the door stays shut.

“It’s locked. You don’t really think we would make it that easy, do you?” Derek taunts. “Besides, I know there’s a part of you that wants this dream to finish.”

“I’m okay,” Stiles retorts, tugging on the handle a few more times for good measure before throwing himself back in the seat and crossing his arms over his chest like a kid having a temper tantrum.

“Aw, come on,” Derek prods, “Don’t be like that. We all know you’re dying for a piece of this. Tell me tall, dark and asshole isn’t your type.”

Stiles keeps his eyes focused on the window. “It’s not.”

“How about this than?” Derek’s voice goes higher and Stiles turns in surprise to see Lydia now driving. Regular 18-year-old Lydia, her red curls down and wild, her lipstick a bright red.

Stiles blinks and his id has returned to Derek’s form. “No,” he sighs, “Lydia’s good and all, but between the two of us, I know Derek is far more of a guilty pleasure.” He smirks wickedly, “Of course the two of them together would be a dream come true, wouldn’t it?”

Stiles says nothing, but this doesn’t seem to bother Derek. “You don’t have to tell me,” he says, “I already know.”

Stiles feels his cheeks burn red. “Just shut up.”

Derek laughs again, “At least you have a chance with Lydia. A slim one, but a chance nonetheless. Derek? All he sees when he looks at you is Scott’s irritating little friend. A nuisance, a liability. You might as well be a buzzing mosquito he’s just dying to smack. But every time he dismisses you just makes you want him more, doesn’t it?”

 “Shut up,” Stiles repeats.

Derek shifts the car’s gear, speeding up. “We can change all that, you know. The Nogitsune, it makes us powerful, impossible to ignore. It makes us dangerous and just Derek Hale’s type.”

Derek’s hand drops from the stick to Stiles’ knee. “You just have to embrace it, Stiles, and it will give us everything and everyone we’ve ever wanted.” His hand slides up Stiles’ thigh, stopping just short of his groin. Stiles looks at the hand, then slowly follows it to his arm, shoulder, and up to Derek’s face. His expression is so eager, so unlike the Derek Stiles is used too, but so real at the same time.

Still flushed, Stiles looks away and swallows. The car has stopped on the side of the road, still acting out a dream that neither he nor Derek are participating in.

“But we can change that,” Derek whispers, leaning over. His words tickle Stiles’ neck.

“You’re not real,” Stiles replies.

“I’m as real as you are.”

“This isn’t real. It’s a dream. You’re not really Derek.”

“No, I’m you. So just think of it as…masturbation,” Derek chuckles, “It won’t be the first time.”

“No!” Stiles yells. The word resonates in the car and Derek leans back surprised.

“No?” Derek blinks, looking confused. The car door clicks to an unlocked position.

Keeping an eye on the id, Stiles blindly grasps at the handle and pulls it. The door gives way behind him and opens, Stiles tumbling out of it backwards.

His ass hits cement, but not the road. He’s in a basement, the high school basement.

A map sits in front of him. It’s the woods, all marked up in red pen and his handwriting. Stiles whips his head around, things are spread out around the floor: boxes, wires, blocks of what he fears might be C-4.

Stiles’ hands begin to move on their own accord, folding up the map, and carefully grabbing one of the boxes. Inside, numbers flash red, but before he can make sense of them, he closes the box and wraps it in plain brown paper. Stiles counts his fingers as they work.

This is real, but he has no control.

Stiles can feel himself slipping away and fights to stay conscious.

Derek’s face swims above him.

They’re in his loft now. Derek’s teasing smile from the car is gone replaced by a scowl Stiles knows all too well.

“You’re not in control anymore,” Derek snarls, “And I won’t be ignored.”

“Didn’t seem that way in the car,” Stiles quips, “No means no, Derek.”

“I was unprepared,” Derek counters, “But the Nogitsune has made me stronger.” He grabbed Stiles by the t-shirt, lifting him effortlessly off the ground and shoving him against the wall.

“You want this Stiles,” he huffs. They’re nearly nose to nose and Stiles can feel every hot breath Derek lets out. “You’ve dreamt about this moment a hundred times before, so just enjoy it,” his voice softens and sweetens. Stiles feels his rapid heartbeat slow, and despite knowing he should be on his toes, alert and ready, he relaxes against the wall.

“I-I,” Stiles stutters.

“You want this,” Derek repeats, and Stiles can feel himself nodding along. He wants this and when Derek leans in, Stiles lets him kiss him.

Derek responds enthusiastically, slipping his tongue in Stiles’ mouth and exploring slowly. Stiles wraps his arms around the older man’s neck trying to make up from their height difference by pulling Derek down and himself up at the same time.

Derek pulls away and begins peppering kisses down Stiles neck. “You want this,” he whispers between each peck, “You want this.” He picks a spot and bites down hard. Stiles digs his fingers into Derek as a response, rocking his body against him in eagerness as Derek sucks the tender spot.

“You just have to join us, Stiles,” Derek releases the skin and coos in his ear, “And this is yours.”

Derek steps back and Stiles draws a sharp breath. His body aches for Derek’s presence, but his head begins to clear.

“Just stop fighting,” Derek implores, “Everything will be so much better then.”

“I,” Stiles shakes his head, “No, I, I can’t.”

Derek’s sweet smile turns into a scowl. His eyes flash blue and his face begins to morph into its wolf form.

“Fine,” he hisses, “If you’re not going to join us, then we’ll just have to kill you.”

He lunges for Stiles, but the shorter boy ducks, breaking into a sprint for the door.

Behind him Derek lets out a terrifying roar, but Stiles rips open the loft door with all his strength and bounds through, slamming it shut behind him.


	4. Chapter 4

Panting, Stiles leans his forehead against the door. The id is right about one thing, he’s losing control, not just of his body but of his mind as well.

“Stiles?” A warm voice calls out and Stiles takes a deep breath, preparing himself for whatever’s coming.

“Just where do you think you’re going?” Stiles turns and lets out a small gasp.

“Mom?”

Claudia Stilinski stands in the doorway to the kitchen of the Stilinski house. Her hands sit on her hips, an apron tied around her waist, her face trying to scowl, but a smile threatening to come out behind it.

“I wanna go with Dad?” Stiles knows this memory well and he plays along, his voice coming off far more childish than he’s used to.

He’s nine and the world still makes sense.

“I know, sweetheart,” Claudia’s smile shines as she walks towards him, wrapping her arms around his shoulders. She doesn’t seem to notice he’s taller than her now as she slowly guides him back into the kitchen, “But Daddy’s very busy.”

His mother has just been diagnosed. She and his father haven’t told him yet, but Stiles can tell something is wrong.

“I can help him!” Stiles insists. Claudia sits him down in a seat at the table, smoothing down his hair and placing a kiss on the top of his head.

“We are going to help him,” she tells him, grabbing a bowl and a spoon of the counter, “By making delicious cookies for him to enjoy when he gets home, okay?”

Stiles remembers feeling irritated at the time. Driving around with his dad catching bad guys was far more exciting than baking with his mom, but now it’s all he wants to do.

Claudia hands him the bowl and spoon and instructs him to mix until the dough is smooth and Stiles obeys, watching his mother intently as she moves around the kitchen, singing softly in polish.

“All done?” she asks him after some time.

Stiles nods and she brings over several cookie sheets and a fork.

“Okay,” she says, “I’m going to make balls of dough and put them on here, and your job is to smush them down with this fork, twice so there’s a crisscross pattern, like this,” she demonstrates quickly, “Okay?”

“Can’t I make the balls?” Stiles asks.

Claudia taps his nose. “Uh-uh _kochanie,_ I know better than that. You get your hands in that bowl and this kitchen will be covered in dough in ten seconds flat.”

Stiles giggles, “I’ll be careful!” he insists, “Promise.”

“Pinky promise?” Claudia offers her finger. Stiles nods solemnly, “Pinky promise.” His voice has gone deeper, back to its usual tone. He swallows and takes a breath, going off script. “I love you, mama.”

Suddenly, like in the first memory, he is no longer taking place in it, but just watching from the entrance to the kitchen as a younger version of himself carefully rolls out small balls of dough, occasionally looking to his mother for approval. Claudia smiles, pleased every time, and continues to sing the lullaby she rocked Stiles to sleep with for so many years.

It’s the last good memory Stiles has of his mom. The last one that doesn’t involve her forgetting to shut the stove off, or staring at him like he’s a stranger. The last one without her screaming at his father to get them away from her, the imaginary demons that kept her up at night.

Tears run down Stiles’ cheeks. He wipes furiously at his eyes. When he looks up his mother is in front of him, little Stiles at the table gone.

“Don’t cry, _kochanie_ , _”_ she takes him into her arms and hugs him tight, “It’s going to be alright.”

“What do I do, mama?” he whispers into her shirt.

“Go to your room,” Claudia says, pulling away.

Stiles stares at her, confused. “What?”

But Claudia doesn’t respond. She’s back at the table with his younger self, pressing the fork into the cookies and singing softly.

Stiles gives the memory one last pained look before heading out of the kitchen and up the stairs to his bedroom.

Unlike most of the doors he’s gone through, this one is slightly opened and the sight sends a shiver down his spine.

When is a door not a door?

He cautiously pushes the door open with two fingers. It’s his room, 17-year-old Stiles, that is, not the nine-year-old sitting downstairs. His pictures and strings cover the walls and he traces the patterns the strings make absently. He reaches the William Barrow section and stares at the words he had written.

_‘bomb=present, same as me?’_

_Bomb…_

Stiles jolts, he had seen himself, the Nogitsune, wrapping a bomb. Had it gone off yet? Could he do anything to stop it?

If only he knew where the bomb was.

Stiles drops onto his bed, glaring angrily at the ceiling. It wasn’t fair the Nogitsune knew everything about him, yet he knew nothing about it. It kept talking as though they were one, but in that case, shouldn’t it be a two-way street? If it had access to his memories….

Stiles squeezes his eyes shut and tries to focus on the Nogitsune. Tries to remember it’s face, his face, how it had been in the basement and in the hospital room. He tries to recall everything it said, everything he thinks it might have done.

A sharp pain erupts in Stiles’ temples. He screams out, curling inwards as memories flood his mind. Writing on the board the first time, standing on the roof of the hospital, destroying the Oni in the hospital, talking to a woman he thinks might be Kira’s mother. The basement of the school, a blueprint of the hospital, the woods, the basement again, sending a package, taking something from Allison’s house, or was he leaving something?

They came at him too fast for Stiles to understand half of them, but he finds what he’s looking for.

The Sheriff’s station.

Stiles opens his eyes. He’s no longer in his room, but the basement of the school again.

He grasps in the darkness, trying to find a flashlight, something to light the room. His fingers curl around something and hit a switch on the side. The flashlight blinks on, then off.

No, not a flashlight. An emitter.

Stiles stares at it. Why the hell would he have one of Chris Argent’s emitters?

It lights up again. Once, twice, three times.

Stiles stands, counting his fingers carefully by the light of the emitter. He’s in control, but something doesn’t feel right. It feels like someone is standing behind him, hovering just over his shoulder, breathing down his neck, watching…

Footsteps echo and Stiles slowly turns to face them.

Aiden and Ethan bare their teeth behind Scott.

“Okay,” his hands go up, “I know what you guys are thinking, but it’s me, I swear to god it’s me.”

He only hopes it’s the truth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Kochanie”- I believe is polish for baby or sweetie, hopefully Google Translate hasn’t let me down and it’s something you’d say to a kid and not a lover.
> 
> Thanks so much for all your awesome reviews and kudos! The next chapters might be a little slow coming because I had a better idea for the direction of this story so I have to rewrite and add a bunch of stuff. Plus real life is kind of crazy this week.


	5. Chapter 5

When Scott and the twins come out of the darkness, Stiles tries to think of everything he wanted to warn them about. But a darkness creeps up his mind, shading the memories he had just gotten from the Nogitsune. They’re just out of reach, the words are on the tip of his tongue, but they stubbornly hang on.

Except for one.

Not that he has a chance to say it, as the twins descend on him before Scott can say a word, shoving him up against the lockers and cutting off his windpipe with one hand.

Scott roars, and they drop him obediently.

Stiles swallows. “It’s me Scott,” he says, “I swear it’s me. I don’t know where I’ve been the past few days or what I’ve been doing, but this is me, I promise.”

Only he does know. Somewhere in his mind Stiles knows the information is there, he just can’t…

“You know what happened at the hospital?” Aiden (Ethan? He still can’t tell them apart) says.

“I know more than that,” He pulls out the blueprints of the hospital he’d saw in the Nogitsune’s memories. His handwriting is scribbled all over and Stiles tries to ignore the goosebumps that scatter his skin when he can’t remember writing any of it.

It’s like the chalkboard all over again.

The twins find a duffel bag full of ropes, chain and C-4. But his attention goes to the map of the forest Scott grabs, the path outlined in red. Scott says something Stiles doesn’t quite hear, and he feels himself respond, but before Stiles registers what he said, and more importantly, the fact that he didn’t say it, the three werewolves take off running.

* * *

Driving a speeding Jeep towards the forest is probably not the best time for Stiles to try and shake the presence of the Nogitsune. But he does it anyway, focusing on the happiest memories he can think of to try and chase it away, only to feel something press back, offering every worst case scenario to what they’ll find in the woods.

The tires screech as they pull to a stop in front of a startled Coach Finstock. The sight of him rings something eerily familiar in Stiles. The memory of his room and the walls covered in photos and string. Scribbled words next to a photo of William Barrow.

_‘Bomb=present?’_

There’s a bomb.

A bomb in the Sherriff’s Station.

The thought of his dad, the need to save his dad overwhelms Stiles. The Nogitsune, silent until this point, screams now as it’s pushed back. The noise makes his head ache, but Stiles charges forward, trying to keep his thoughts straight through the pain.

“Coach!”

“Stilinski?” Coach exclaims as they run up to him.

“Coach, listen close…”

He explains what’s going on as fast and as vague as possible, but gives the most explicit directions for what to do next he can think of. The twins and Scott take off in the meantime, and when he’s finished, Stiles dashes after them.

The pain in his head gets worse as he runs, the Nogitsune fighting back for control. Black spots swirl in his vision and Stiles stumbles, first over tree roots, than nothing at all. It’s almost as if his legs are working against him.

Then, finally, his legs win and he goes down, landing face-first in a pile of leaves. The colors swirl in front of him, changing from brown to green then dissolving into the blue color of his comforter.

He’s back in his room.

Not real, he thinks, looking down at his hands. His fingers blur into one another, making them impossible to count.

“Did you have fun, Stiles?”

Stiles looks up to see his reflection in the mirror. The reflection smirks, not a reflection, the Nogitsune.

“As a matter of fact, yes,” he replies, unable to help himself though he knows he should avoid making this thing angry.

“We’re glad,” the Nogitsune says, looking anything but, “Because you won’t have another chance to do that again for a while.”

“If I took control once, I can do it again,” Stiles retorts.

“You can try,” the Nogitsune shrugs, “But if anything we’re closer now. We don’t need to hide you anymore.” A wide grin splits its face, “We can control you.”

The mirror goes empty. Stiles takes a step closer, trying to see if his reflection will reappear, but the mirror disintegrates as soon as he reaches it. The wall follows suit and soon his whole room is crumbling around him, replaced by three gray walls and thick metal bars.

“Our turn,” the Nogitsune grins from outside the cell.

Stiles jumps up and grabs the thick metal, trying to will it open.

“That’s the problem with a cage with no lock, isn’t it?” The Nogitsune giggles, “No way out.”

“Please,” Stiles’ voice cracks.                             

The Nogitsune’s smile falls and it tilts its head. “You have to understand we don’t want it to be like this. We want to be one, we want you to join us. If you would only accept the darkness inside of you Stiles, we can be unstoppable.”

“Yeah, so you’ve said,” Stiles leans his forehead against the cold metal bars, “And yet here I am, locked in a cage. Good teamwork.”

The Nogitsune considers him for a moment and then snaps its fingers. The bars disappear and Stiles now sits on a bench in the locker room. “You’re right,” it tells him, “You don’t need a cage. You need a maze. A maze that goes so deep in your mind that it’ll drive you insane before you ever manage to reach the surface again. Unless,” it pauses thoughtfully, “You reconsider. Just say the word, and we’ll be one.”

“No thanks,” Stiles spits out.

It leans forward and Stiles instinctively leans back, nearly falling off the bench in the process. “Fine. Have it your way. We control your mind now Stiles. Run through all the doors you want, you’ll never get out.”

Before Stiles can respond the Nogitsune disappears, leaving Stiles alone in the locker room, but not for long. Heavy footsteps, and lots of them echo, growing louder as they near him. Stiles gets a sense of déjà vu, but before he can place the memory, he’s swept up in a crowd of sweaty lacrosse players.

“Good practice boys!” he hears Coach shout although the teacher is nowhere in sight.

Everyone towers above Stiles. He recognizes some of the faces as guys that have since graduated, a few still on the team today.

“Stilinski?” A familiar voice asks. Stiles turns to see Jackson Whittemore smirking at him, “What are you doing here? This practice is first-string only. No bench jockeys.”

Stiles tries to go off script, doing what he’s done before to get out of a memory, but the stuttered explanation that comes out is straight from the second month of freshman year.

“What do we have here?” Alex Vanderbilt, the former captain of the lacrosse team and 7-foot gorilla, grins down at Stiles, who backs up against the lockers.

“Nobody! I’m nobody, just, uh, making my way through, got to go catch a, a, a bus,” his hands fly up in self-defense, but do little to stop Alex from grabbing his shirt collar and dragging him towards the center of the locker room.

“His name’s Stilinski,” Jackson informs, “Goes by Stiles, sits at the end of the bench with McCall.”

Alex raises a brow. “I thought you looked familiar. You’re the one who doesn’t shut up.”

“I don’t think that’s completely fair,” Stiles blathers, but Alex ignores him.

“Who wants to see if we can fit Stilinski here into a locker?”

“I really don’t think that’s-”

Alex gives him a shake, the rest of the team laughs and cheers him on. Stiles feel sick to his stomach, his breathing rapidly increasing. “Better yet, let’s see if putting him in a locker will shut him up.”

Another senior opens a locker for Alex, who tosses Stiles in with ease. The locker is even smaller than he remembers. The door slams shut in his face before he can even protest and almost immediately the darkness seems to enclose on him.

“Let me out!” he yells, banging his hands against the metal.

It echoes and bounces around the impossibly small space. Stiles can barely breathe. The laughing continues outside.

“Let me out!” His heart pounds in his ears, and the slats of light dance before his eyes. How long has it been? It couldn’t be more than a few minutes, but the time seems to stretch on for hours as Stiles yells for help and bangs as hard as he can. The laughter fades.

“Please, let me out,” he’s begging now, his voice a horse whisper, air barely passing through his throat.

He squeezes his eyes shut, the panic attack’s taken over, he’s going to die in a gym room locker and forever be remembered as a joke at Beacon Hills High.

Then suddenly, the door opens and he tumbles out. The room spins, but Stiles is just able to make out a face hovering above him.

“You alright, Stilinski?” Coach Finstock asks.

Stiles gasps for air. “Calm down, kid,” Coach helps him up and leads him over to sit on a bench. “Take some deep breathes.”

Stiles tries to, but it takes him what feels like ages to be able to just get a normal breathe down, much less a deep one.

Finally, the attack seems to pass. Coach pats him on the back. “Next time, don’t be such an easy target, Stilinski,” the man advises, before heading back to his office.

Stiles watches him go incredulously. It’s his first real interaction with the coach, the first time he actually thinks he might hate someone. The bullies like Alex and Jackson suck, but at least you know what you’re going to get with them. But Finstock is a teacher, he’s supposed to be the one that protects, that stops the bullies, and instead he tells Stiles not to be such an easy target?

It makes Stiles’ blood boil.

But Coach has gotten better, a voice whispers in his ear. And Alex works in a gas station now that he broke his collarbone and lost his lacrosse scholarship. And Jackson in is England and all of this happened a long time ago. It’s just a memory. A memory that the Nogitsune put him in.

Footsteps and voices echo in the hallway again. It’s a memory that is restarting.

Stiles looks around wildly for a door, spotting the entrance for Coach’s office and makes a dash for it. He may be trapped, but he’s not going to be trapped in this hellhole.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think it’s totally possible (and probably) it was the Nogitsune the whole episode, but we’ll never really know will we?
> 
> Time gets a little funny in the next couple chapters because a lot more time passes for Stiles than in the real world.


	6. Chapter 6

Stiles is driving.

Not exactly noteworthy, but a little alarming as he has no memory of getting in the car or starting it, and he has no idea where he would be driving to.

His body seems to disagree as he takes a turn on Walden Avenue. It’s like he’s on auto-pilot.

No, a voice whispers in his head, you’re driving to Scott’s, remember?

Right, he does remember now. Someone found a dead body in the woods (there have been no shortage of those in the past couple of years) and he’s going over to Scott’s because there’s definitely something supernatural about the death.

Scott’s driveway is already full, so Stiles parks on the street. The twins’ motorcycles are there, along with a couple cars, one of which he recognizes as Lydia’s.

He can see movement in the house from the windows and checks his phone as he walks up the pathway to the front door. Did he miss a call, a text?

Stiles is used to just walking in Scott’s house, so he’s surprised to find the door locked. Irritated, he rings the bell. Indistinct voices chatter from inside, but stop after the bell. Stiles leans in closer to listen, only to hear footsteps approaching. He jumps back just in time for Scott to open the door.

“Hey man,” he says cheerily, “You hear about the dead body in the woods?”

Scott looks distracted. “Yeah,” he says, “Can you come back later, Stiles. We’re kind of busy.”

“We who?” Stiles barrels past Scott into the house, he can see Isaac and the twins, along with Lydia and Allison watching from the kitchen.

“Hey guys!” he waves. No one says anything in return. Scott taps his shoulder and Stiles turns to face him.

“You should go, Stiles,” Scott tells him.

“What are you talking about?” Stiles frowns, “Dead body, woods? This kind of has our names written all over it.”

“I know,” Scott says uncomfortably, “We’re already working on a plan.”

“Yeah? Well, don’t leave me in the dark, what do you guys think it is? What can I do to help?”

“You can leave,” Isaac has come out of the kitchen now and stares down Stiles with his arms crossed.

“What?” Stiles looks back to Scott confused, but Scott turns away.

“We have it under control,” Isaac continues, “We don’t need some human messing our plans up.”

“Allison’s human,” Stiles retorts.

“Allison can handle herself,” Aiden and Ethan have come out now, “Last time you got involved, you let yourself get possessed because you were too weak to handle yourself against the Nogitsune.”

“Your dad’s not even Sheriff anymore,” Allison adds, “So you’re pretty much as useless as a person can be.”

“You guys are crazy,” Stiles says, “Scott, tell them they’re being crazy.”

Scott finally meets his eye again. His friend’s eyes glow red. “They’re right, Stiles. We don’t need you. I don’t need you. You should leave.”

“Scott, what are you talking about?” Stiles’ mouth goes dry, “You’re my best friend. We’re practically brothers.”

Scott opens the front door, his mouth twisting into a smirk. “You really think that’s still true? I’ve got power now, Stiles. I’m the _alpha_. What use do I have for you anymore? All you do is get in the way.”

Stiles feels like he’s going insane. This can’t be happening right now. None of it makes any sense.

“Fine,” he says, mind racing, “I’ll go.”

The others grin triumphantly as Scott passes by him to join them. Isaac claps him on the shoulder and the twins flank them as they turn their backs to him and head back into the kitchen. All of them, except Lydia, who remains in the doorway, staring at him.

“Want to get your shots in before I leave?” he asks.

“That’s the wrong door,” she says.

“What?” Stiles looks to the door, then back to her, “Has everyone gone completely crazy?”

“That’s the wrong door,” Lydia insists, pointing behind her to the kitchen, “You need to go out the backdoor.”

Stiles blinks. “This isn’t real,” he whispers. Another trap from the Nogitsune, he’s still in his head. He rushes forward, past Lydia.

“What are you doing?” Isaac roars, his golden eyes flashing, teeth bared.

“Stop him!” Scott orders. Ethan grabs Stiles from behind, yanking him back from the backdoor. Allison suddenly has her bow, an arrow notched and pointed at his throat. Stiles pulls himself down with all his might, ducking out of Ethan’s grasp and out of Allison’s range.

Aiden growls and grabs his wrist, but Stiles breaks out of this hold as well, only to run into Isaac. He swerves, just missing the other boy’s punch and grabs a hold of the doorknob.

“Don’t do it, Stiles,” Scott warns, “It only gets worse from here. You can’t handle it.”

“You’re not Scott and you don’t know anything about me,” Stiles says quickly, pulling the door open and slipping through before Scott can reply.

The door slams shut and Stiles wakes up in a bed.

A monitor beeps to his left and the familiar sound makes him immediately yank his arms up to his face to ensure himself they aren’t secured down.

“Whoa, easy there,” Stiles turns to see his dad enter the room. The hospital room, he’s in the hospital.

“Dad, what happened?”

“I just left to get some coffee,” the Sheriff smiles, “No need to sound the alarm.”

“No, no,” Stiles shakes his head, “I mean there was the forest and the bomb in your office!”

“It’s the disease Stiles,” his father looks at him sadly, like he’s told him this many times before, “You know that. You’re suffering from delusions. It’s not real.”

Stiles tears out his IV, wincing at the soaring pain that shoots up his arms and scrambles to get out of the bed. His dad catches him as soon as he takes a step. To the outside observer, it might have seemed like a hug, but the embrace is too tight. Stiles feels his lungs contracting.

“Let go,” he wheezes.

The Sheriff just laughs. “I can’t wait until it finally takes you,” he whispers menacingly, “Can’t wait until this disease kills you so I can finally be rid of you.”

“Let go!” Stiles rips out of his dad’s arms with all his strength. The Sheriff still blocks his exit

“Just give up,” his dad laughs, “You can’t possibly win.”

“Yeah, well I’ve never been one to make smart decisions,” Stiles mumbles. He goes for the door again, the Sheriff catching him once more. This time, Stiles back up bringing his father towards the bed with him and it’s the Sheriff that breaks his grasp.

“It only gets worse from here,” he says, repeating Scott’s earlier words and breaking all pretense of the nightmare. “Really, I’m protecting you.”

“Somehow I doubt that,” Stiles retorts. The Sheriff lunges for him, but Stiles is quicker, slamming down the handcuffs he’d grabbed from his dad’s belt during their second “hug” on his wrist and the hospital bed.

“What-?” The Sheriff tugs and tries to grab Stiles, but he dances out of his father’s reach and towards the door.

The nightmares and memories only get worse from there. Stiles relives every painfully embarrassing moment of his short life, every nightmare he’s ever had, every anxiety he’s ever felt brought to life.

He runs through them as fast as he can. Sometimes forgetting where he is, that they’re not real, but always remembering eventually, finding the door that leads him to the next, but never out.

It’s like the worst haunted house ever.

After escaping Lydia trying to drown him again in Deaton’s office, insisting he’ll never save his dad, Stiles is pretty sure he’s close to the exit, confirmed only by Lydia’s warning as he grabs the front door to the vet’s office.

“It only gets worse from here.”

“Yeah, yeah, so you keep saying,” Stiles huffs.

Lydia grins, almost mockingly. “Think about it Stiles, there’s only one memory left, isn’t there? Save the best for last and all that?”

Stiles swallows and stares determinedly at the door. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he insists, opening the door and heading through, trying to ignore the Nogitsune’s laughter behind him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Er, sorry about the big break in between updates. It was half school and half wanting to know where the season was going to go before I finished writing this.


	7. Chapter 7

Stiles is eleven and his mother stares at him in confusion.

“Mom?” he asks in a small voice, “Mama? It’s me.”

Claudia blinks, the bewildered expression remains.

“ _Brat_?” she whispers.

“Brat?” Stiles repeats, voice wavering.

Claudia shakes her head violently. “ _Braat_!” She cries, lengthening the ‘ah’ sound in the word.

Stiles shifts uncomfortably in the hospital chair. “Dad will be back soon, Mom,” he says, “He promised.”

Claudia continues to cry. Her thin hands cover her face, hiding the dark circles that have become a permanent fixture under her eyes. The doctors say she barely eats and never sleeps unless they sedate her.

“ _Brat_ ,” she whimpers, “Brother. _Przepraszam_ , I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay, Mom,” Stiles says, “Dad will be back soon.”

If Claudia hears him, she gives no indication, muttering to herself half in English and half in Polish. Stiles hesitantly stands and puts a hand on her shoulder.

“No!” Claudia shrieks, wrenching herself away, “No _! Duch! Duch_!” She begins to babble frantically, waving her right arm around.

Tears well up in Stiles’ eyes and he runs from the room. Behind him, he can hear his mother’s heart monitor beeping widely.

“She’s having a stroke!” Someone behind him yells. Stiles covers his ears and runs, runs, runs.

Then, wham.

He hits something solid and falls on his ass.

A hand grabs his arms, pulling it from its clamped position over Stiles’ ear.

“What are you doing?” The stench of alcohol is heavy on his father’s breath.

“Nothing,” Stiles whimpers, opening his eyes. He tries to wiggle out of his father’s grasp to no avail.

“Can you just sit still?” Dad begs, “Can you just sit still for two minutes?”

“I was,” Stiles tries to explain, but Dad cuts him off.

“I don’t want to hear it!” Spit flies in Stiles’ face and he winces. “We just put your mother in her goddamn grave and I want some goddamn peace and quiet in this house!”

“I know, I only-”

“I don’t want to fucking hear it, Stiles!” Dad roars, raising his other arm and Stiles squeezes his eyes shut, waiting to feel the sting of the slap.

But it doesn’t come.

He opens his eyes and meets his father’s glassy gaze.

“Dad?”

“Just go to your room,” he growls, dropping Stiles’ arm, “And stay there.”

“I’m-”

“Now, Stiles!”

Stiles scampers away, rubbing his sore arm. Behind him he can hear his father crying.

“Why Claudia? Why’d you have to leave me with this kid? I don’t know what to do with him. I don’t know what to do without you.”

Stiles is back in the chair in the hospital room. His mother stares at him in confusion.

“ _Brat?”_

She cries, he tries to comfort her, she screams, he runs, he runs into his father, the Sheriff yells at him and cries and it begins all over again.

It is the worst day of Stiles’ life and it never ends.

_I was wrong_ , he thinks as he stares into his mother’s terrified eyes, _I can’t handle this. I’m not strong enough._

_I just want it to stop_ , he begs as his father yells in his face, _I’ll do anything. Just give me a way out._

He runs from the room, the beeping and frantic voices behind him, hands tight against his ears. He slams into a body, falls back on his ass.

But no one grabs him.

Stiles opens one eye, than the other.

“You’d do anything?” Derek kneels down in front of him, “Anything?”

He swallows and nods. Derek gives him a toothy grin.

“That door,” he points to another hospital room, “That’s the door out.”

Stiles stands on shaky legs and with trembling fingers, turns the knob and goes through the door.

He’s chained to a wall.

Scott stands in front of him, sharpening a blade. Or at least it looks like Scott. But there is a malicious grin on his face and his eyes glow bright red.

“What are you doing?” Stiles asks.

“We’re gonna play a little game, Stiles,” Scott replies, “A little game called ‘How Long Will it Take?’”

“How long will what take?” Stiles says, immediately regretting the question.

Scott just smirks, “Oh you’ll know it when it happens.”

The chains holding Stiles to the wall disintegrate and he falls to the floor. Scott tosses him the blade he was sharpening. It clatters at Stiles’ feet and he stares at it dumbly.

“Ready?” Scott asks, flashing his fangs and extending his claws.

“Ready-?” Stiles doesn’t even have a chance to respond before Scott is upon him, slashing him with his claws, tackling him to the ground.

“Fight!” Scott commands, pulling Stiles up and shoving the blade into his hand, “Fight!”

He punches Stiles in the face. Stiles falls to the ground again. Scott lands a kick to his stomach.

“No!” Stiles cries back, “I’m not going to fight you.”

Scott laughs. “Too afraid?” he taunts, giving Stiles another kick, “You couldn’t kill me if you tried.”

Stiles tosses the blade to the side and holds up his arms in surrender.

Scott wrinkles his nose in distaste. “You’re even more useless than I thought.”

“Pathetic,” a voice behinds him agrees. Stiles whirls around to see Derek approaching him, his blue eyes glow in the darkness. “But you have potential, Stiles. So much potential.”

Stiles turns back to Scott, but he’s gone. His grip tightens on the blade in his hand and his eyes widen when he realizes it’s returned to his grasp.

Derek is inches away now. “Come on, Stiles,” his voice is low and velvety, “Slit my throat.” He tilts his chin up, offering the pale skin to Stiles.

“It will feel so good,” he assures. And for a moment, Stiles believes him. The image of blood running down Derek’s neck and chest fills him with pleasure and Stiles suddenly feels sick to his stomach.

“N-no!” He drops the knife again, “Stop it. I’m not, I’m not hurting anyone.”

He whirls around, desperately looking for an exit.

“Not even if your life depended on it?” Derek is gone now and Allison stands before him, crossbow trained at his head.

“No!” Stiles exclaims. Allison lets her arrow fly and he drops to the ground, narrowly missing it.

“Come on!” she cries, coming at him with her blade. Stiles blocks her with the knife that has reappeared in his hand.

“That’s better,” she grins, swinging her second blade towards him. Stiles blocks again and they go back and forth, Stiles just barely able to keep up with her quick moves. Adrenaline pumps through his veins and with a little more force he manages to knock on of her knives away, than the other. Allison stands defenseless and Stiles draws his arm back prepared to slash again.

“Do it!” she insists.

His arm freezes. She’s defenseless. She’s Allison. What is he doing?

The blade clatters to the ground.

“Pity,” Isaac says behind him delivering a blow to his side that sends Stiles reeling.

The knife is in his hand again, but he refuses to lift his arm as Isaac drags him back to the wall and chains his left arm up. “This ought to be fun,” he says. Stiles doesn’t bother replying, and pretty soon he couldn’t even if he wanted to. Isaac uses him as a makeshift punching bag, delivering blow after blow, occasionally mixing it up with a kick or slash with his claws.

The taste of copper fills Stiles’ mouth. He can only see out of his right eye.

“Don’t you want to fight back?” Isaac asks, “Don’t you want to hurt me?”

“I can’t,” Stiles replies, “I can’t.”

“Because I’m part of the pack?” Isaac rolls his eyes. “Fine.”

His image goes blurry, then splits into two. Stiles blinks, trying to fix his vision and the twins come into focus.

“How about us?” Aiden asks, “Can you hurt us?”

Ethan releases his arm from the chains and immediately pounces. “We killed Erica!” he laughs striking Stiles’ jaw with a wicked crack and throwing his beaten body to his brother.

“We killed Boyd,” Aiden continues, punching Stiles in the gut and kicking him to the floor.

“It would feel good,” Ethan assures him, offering him the knife, “To kill at least one of us, wouldn’t it?”

“Maybe even both?” Aiden kneels down next to his brother and grabs Stiles by the neck, his claws dig into the skin. “Come on, Stiles.”

Stiles grasps the knife tight and stabs it into Aiden’s leg. The werewolf lets out a howl of pain and drops him. Stiles scampers to the other side of the room.

The howl turns into laughter and the twins morph back into one figure. The man stands, ripping the knife out of his leg and tosses it towards Stiles.

“We’re getting closer, aren’t we?” Peter Hale asks, walking towards him, “How about me, Stiles? Would you like to kill me?”

Stiles picks up the knife this time, holding it warily as Peter approaches. He lunges immediately, offering Stiles no chance to defend himself with the knife, clawing, punching, biting and kicking him.

Stiles feebly waves the blade, trying to fight Peter off. But it’s no use.

“You are weak,” Peter says, “If I had given you that bite on the field you would have died. But then again, it probably would have been for the best, wouldn’t it? Scott wouldn’t need to protect you. Your father could move on with his life. I can correct that mistake now for you if you’d like. I can kill you now.”

Peter delivers a final blow, knocking Stiles across the room.

Anger pools into Stiles like a white hot fire. His injuries seem to vanish as his hatred of Peter grows. He pushes himself off the ground and grabs ahold of the knife. Peter smirks.

“Still have a bit of fight in you left then?” He asks, approaching. Stiles stares at the ground, waiting.

Peter nears. “Well?” he says, “How long will-”

Stiles looks up and shoves the knife into Peter’s stomach, cutting the werewolf off. Peter looks down at the blade and back up to Stiles.

“Not long at all,” he laughs, blood dripping out of his mouth.

The brick walls around them fall away to reveal the animal shelter. Stiles feels the knife change in his grasp. His eyes lock onto Peter’s as the wolf’s blue eyes turn red and then a familiar brown and the older man’s his face slowly morphs into Scott’s.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N- My polish is just from Google translate so feel free to correct me.  
> Brat is Polish for brother, Przepraszam means I’m sorry, and Duch is ghost.
> 
> I have this weird headcannon that Stiles is named after his uncle on his mother’s side who died young and Stiles looks like him so when his mother was suffering from dementia she thought Stiles was his uncle.


	8. Chapter 8

Stiles tries to release the sword, tries to pull it out from his best friend’s stomach, but his body revolts, his hands twisting the sword, his arms pushing it deeper.

“We need this, Stiles,” The Nogitsune purrs in his ear, “Scott’s been absorbing people’s pain all day, and we _need_ it.”

 _I can’t_ , he tries to beg, _I can’t hurt Scott_.

“Why not?” it asks, “He doesn’t care about you, remember?”

Scott’s horrified face flickers into the smug smirk he’d wore as he laughed in Stiles’ face and told him a powerless human was worthless to him now.

_That’s not him! That’s not real!_

“Does it hurt?” A voice echoes around him. It’s his own voice, but Stiles just barely recognizes it. “Hey, look at me,” Scott’s face, his real, horrified and pained face swarms back into view.

“It may not be him now, but it will someday. All of those wolves are the same,” the Nogitsune scoffs.

“You should have done your reading, Scott. See, a nogitsune feeds off chaos, strife and pain,” Stiles is speaking again. Or the Nogitsune is talking through him, he isn’t sure.

Scott flickers again and Stiles is stabbing Derek with the sword. Then Isaac, Ethan, Aiden, Peter.

“This morning, you took it from Isaac, then you took it from Coach. And then from a dying deputy. All that pain.”

“He deserves it.”

“You took it all. Now, give it to me.”

Scott returns. His eyes glow blood red as he laughs in Stiles’ face. “You couldn’t kill me if you tried,” he hisses.

“Let me in, Stiles,” the Nogitsune begs, “Let the darkness in.”

Stiles obeys, tears mixing with rain water on his cheeks. A tingle of pleasure chases up his spine when Scott’s eyes turn from red to their normal brown.

“You really have to learn, Scott,” Stiles says, “You really have to learn not to trust a fox. Know why? 'Cause they're tricksters. They'll fool you. They'll fool everyone.”

Stiles can feel it, the darkness flowing out of Scott and into himself. He can feel the Nogitsune growing stronger and stronger, his own awareness lessening. The last thing he feels is pressure on his back and then everything fades to black.

* * *

Stiles’ first thought when he comes to is just how tired he is about this blacking out shit.

He’s leaning on a desk, sitting in a chair, a chair with wheels on it judging by how far he slides when he pushes back from the desk.

The familiar scene of his father’s office surrounds him. It’s intact and unmarred from the bomb so Stiles decides to make the safe bet that it’s not real.

“Good guess,” Lydia leans against the door frame.

“Super-ego,” he says.

She shrugs, “Yeah, I suppose. Come on.”

She motions for him to follow her as she walks out of the office and into the main station. He hurries after her down the hall way leading to the holding cells. They’re all empty with the exception of one. A body huddles on the bench, but even pressed up against the bars, Stiles can’t make it out.

“The Nogitsune?” he asks.

Lydia nods.

“What happened?”

“How should I know?” She sounds irritated.

“Right,” Stiles mutters, “You’re me. I don’t know so you don’t know.”

Lydia sighs. “Whatever happened, it’s stopped. For now at least.”

Stiles recalls the pressure on his neck, than he remembers the events just before.

“It felt good,” he whispers, “For a second it felt good to ram that sword through my best friend’s stomach.”

“You weren’t you, you weren’t in control.”

Stiles nods along like he believes her and tries to get a better look at the creature in the cage to distract himself from the truth. The Nogitsune shivers and turns and Stiles takes a quick step back. It still jars him to see his own face on the creature.

The form shakes again, turning into the bandaged monster that stalked Stiles in the basement, then back into Stiles.

“Creepy,” Stiles shudders, “So what do we do now?”

“You’re unconscious now,” Lydia says, “When you wake up, you’ll be in control and you have to keep that control for as long as possible.”

“Yeah, I figured that much out on my own.”

Lydia glares at him.

“Right,” Stiles rubs his neck, “Or you figured it out and I just knew because we’re the same person.”

Lydia turns back to the Nogitsune. “You let him in,” she says, “You killed Peter-”

“That was a dream!”

“And then you stabbed Scott!”

“You said I wasn’t in control!”

“No, you said that,” Lydia corrects, “Because that’s what you want to believe.”

Stiles falls silent.

“We have to get somewhere safe,” she says, running her finger along the cell, “Some place we can’t hurt anybody.”

“Do you think…do you think I should…?” The question dies at his lips, but Lydia seems to get his meaning.

“I don’t know,” she admits, “We don’t want anyone to get hurt because of us, but,” she smiles, “It’s a pretty noble sacrifice for a 17-year-old to make.”

Stiles leans his head against the cool bars. “This is insane,” he says, “I feel like I’m going insane.”

“What is he that builds stronger than either the mason, the shipwright, or the carpenter?” rasps a voice from inside the cell.

Stiles and Lydia both jump back.

“What is he that builds stronger than either the mason, the shipwright, or the carpenter?” it repeats, eyes still closed.

“Don’t answer it, Stiles,” Lydia says quickly, but Stiles ignores her and moves closer.

“It’s from Shakespeare,” he says, “Hamlet.”

“What is he that builds stronger than either the mason, the shipwright, or the carpenter?”

He looks back to Lydia, her eyes wide with fear, her image hazy.

“The gravedigger.”

The scene dissolves before she or the Nogitsune can respond.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know that stabbing scene is a little confusing, it's just lines Stiles said in the show intermixed with the Nogitsune egging him on.
> 
> I don't really watch Teen Wolf anymore so there's a good chance I won't update this again, but I found these chapters when looking through my computer so enjoy for now

**Author's Note:**

> Like I said, first Teen Wolf fic. I'm kind of obsessed with Nogitsune Stiles and really like the idea of Stiles fighting with himself/the Nogitsune like he was in Riddled. So this sort of follows the idea he's in his head with this thing and will fit in the two days between Riddled and Letharia Vulpina, cover the events of the former and hopeful remain canon-compliant into Echo House. 
> 
> Again, you'll have to forgive me, I only have a basic understanding of Freud mostly from high school psych, but it's not really supposed to be a Freudian statement or whatever, that's just the way Stiles is interpreting what's going on.


End file.
